CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – From left, Kennedy Space Center Director Bob Cabana, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, Tina Palacio and Bolden's aide Kirk Sander leave the Vehicle Assembly Building after viewing the Ares I-X operations. Behind Palacios is Acting Associate Administrator of Exploration Systems Doug Cook, and at far right is Chief of Staff in the Office of the Administrator George Whitesides. Bolden is touring several facilities at Kennedy involved with NASA's Constellation Program. Bolden also was at Kennedy for several events, including the landing of space shuttle Endeavour's STS-127 mission and the signing of the joint NASA-Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency agreement defining the terms of cooperation between the agencies on the Global Precipitation Measurement, or GPM, mission. Photo credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett KSC-2009-4370
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CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – From left, Kennedy Space Center Director Bob Cabana, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, Tina Palacio and Bolden's aide Kirk Sander leave the Vehicle Assembly Building after viewing the Ares I-X operations. Behind Palacios is Acting Associate Administrator of Exploration Systems Doug Cook, and at far right is Chief of Staff in the Office of the Administrator George Whitesides. Bolden is touring several facilities at Kennedy involved with NASA's Constellation Program. Bolden also was at Kennedy for several events, including the landing of space shuttle Endeavour's STS-127 mission and the signing of the joint NASA-Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency agreement defining the terms of cooperation between the agencies on the Global Precipitation Measurement, or GPM, mission. Photo credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett
The Space Shuttle program was the United States government's manned launch vehicle program from 1981 to 2011, administered by NASA and officially beginning in 1972. The Space Shuttle system—composed of an orbiter launched with two reusable solid rocket boosters and a disposable external fuel tank— carried up to eight astronauts and up to 50,000 lb (23,000 kg) of payload into low Earth orbit (LEO). When its mission was complete, the orbiter would re-enter the Earth's atmosphere and lands as a glider. Although the concept had been explored since the late 1960s, the program formally commenced in 1972 and was the focus of NASA's manned operations after the final Apollo and Skylab flights in the mid-1970s. It started with the launch of the first shuttle Columbia on April 12, 1981, on STS-1. and finished with its last mission, STS-135 flown by Atlantis, in July 2011.
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